12 Ways Your Aggressiveness Is Slowly Killing Your Relationships

Passive-aggressiveness includes the obvious passive, withdrawn or apathetic approach to relationships. This approach will spill over into all sort of adult relationships, from friendships, intimate partners, school and on to the workplace.

Passive-aggressiveness never serves anyone well, and will only harm the passive-aggressive persons themselves, and those relationships they truly wish to cultivate.

The American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) has classified passive-aggressiveness as many things throughout the years.

It first appeared in 1952. Since then, it’s been called a ”personality style”, ”hidden hostility”, a ”defense mechanism”, a ”personality disorder” and ”negativistic.” Regardless of how you view it, or which title you prefer, it’s a confusing and harmful defense that leaves both sides less clear on their relationship. This cloudy communication style is detrimental to any relationship.

The passive-aggressives don’t let people know how they really feel or what they really want.

When you hold back from speaking up or clarifying where you stand on an issue, your passive-aggressiveness is triggered because you feel scared, unsafe or concerned that doing so will mean you no longer will receive the approval of the person you want to impress or be liked by.

This passive-aggressive pattern is dangerous in a relationship because if the person you are in a relationship with doesn’t know what you really think or want, they are not really in a relationship with you, as you truly are. With time, this only becomes more detrimental to your relationship. You will feel resentment at living phoney and forcing yourself to walk on eggshells. They will feel they don’t really know you. And in fact, they don’t.

These are two very big red relationship flags and some of the worst feelings one can feel in any relationship: unaddressed resentment and communicating like a stranger.